John, by the grace of God, king of England, lord of Ireland, duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, and count of Anjou, to the archbishop, bishops, abbots, earls, barons, justiciaries, foresters, sheriffs, stewards, servants, and to all his bailiffs and liege subjects, greetings. Know that, having regard to God and for the salvation of our soul, and those of all our ancestors and heirs, and unto the honor of God and the advancement of his holy Church and for the rectifying of our realm, we have granted as underwritten by advice of our venerable fathers, Stephen, archbishop of Canterbury, primate of all England and cardinal of the holy Roman Church, Henry, archbishop of Dublin … More

John Doe and Magna Carta

We often hear in Hollywood movies and TV shows that unidentified bodies, missing persons, or suspects  are referred to as John (or Jane) Doe. The term comes not from the USA, as many might think, but from merrie olde England.

It was introduced into English legal practice about the time of King Edward III (1312-1377), in consequence of a provision of Magna Carta (June 15, 1215) requiring the production of witnesses before every criminal trial. John and Richard Doe were then inserted as the names of the alleged witnesses.  (Evans 1988)

The original source for this is R Chambers's Book of Days (1881). Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1988) adds "Any plaintiff and defendant in an action of ejectment. They were sham names formerly used to save certain 'niceties of law'. This legal fiction was abolished by the Common Law Procedure Act, 1852. The names 'John o'Noakes' and 'Tom Styles' were similarly used." So, like Halloween, Valentine's Day and Mothers' Day, we have here another seemingly American tradition that's as ancient and English as Yorkshire Pudding.

Ivor H Evans, Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, Cassell, London, 1988

Wikisource has the original Latin text of Magna Carta and the English translation.

1300 Italian writer Dante Alighieri became Prior of Florence, despite his lack of prior experience.

1381 England: Wat Tyler, the leader of the Peasants' Revolt, a rebellion against the poll tax, was killed at Smithfield as a result of a fight with William Walworth, the Lord Mayor of London; the circumstances of this are uncertain.

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1389 Battle of Kosovo: The Turks defeated the Serbs and Bosnians.

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1520 Pope Leo X threatened to excommunicate reformer Martin Luther.

1752 Benjamin Franklin flew a kite in a thunderstorm to prove his theory that electricity and lightning are related phenomena.

1775 American Revolutionary War: George Washington was appointed commander-in-chief of the Continental Army.

1784 In discussing the advisability of finishing every book one begins, Dr Samuel Johnson remarked to his biographer James Boswell: "You may as well resolve that whatever men you happen to get acquainted with, you are to keep them for life."

1785 Two French balloonists died in the world's first fatal aviation accident.

1790 French Protestants massacred 300 Roman Catholics.

1804 New Hampshire approved the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratifying the document.

1825 Prince Frederick, 1st Duke of York and Albany (1763 - 1827) laid the foundation stone of the new London Bridge.
 
The City of London decided to replace the old bridge, the piers of which were so close together, and the current of the Thames so rapid, that many boatmen's lives had been lost there over the years. 

The first bridge of London was built between the years of 993 and 1016; made of wood. There was a vulgar tradition that the foundation of the old stone bridge was laid upon woolpacks. This was because it was made in part with a tax on wool. The first stone bridge began in 1176 and finished in 1209, and was damaged by fire in 1212. 

Upon it was placed the head of the great chancellor Sir Thomas More. It fell off the pole it was on into the Thames, and was found by a waterman, who gave it to his daughter. She kept it all her life as a relic and directed in her will that it should be buried with her. 

London Bridge is falling down,
Falling down, Falling down.
London Bridge is falling down,
My fair lady. 

London Bridge may now be found at Lake Havasu City, Arizona, USA. It was bought at auction by American business magnate Robert McCulloch for US$2.46 million, and transported stone by stone to the US. The Lord Mayor of London even laid the cornerstone (September 23, 1968) in the new, incongruous, Arizonan location.

1836 Arkansas was admitted as the 25th US state.

1844 American inventor Charles Goodyear received a patent for vulcanization, a process to strengthen rubber.

1844 Thomas Campbell died. He was the Scottish poet who first said, supposedly inspired by a view of Edinburgh,

"'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view."

1846 The Oregon Treaty established the 49th parallel as the border between the United States and Canada, from the Rocky Mountains to the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

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1860 Florence Nightingale opened the world's first school for nurses, at St Thomas's Hospital, London.

1862 Frank Gardiner, bushranger, led a gold escort robbery near Forbes, NSW, Australia.

Highwaymen, outlaws, bushrangers, pirates, gangsters, etc in the Book of Days

1864 American Civil War: Battle of Petersburg began – Union forces under General Ulysses S Grant and troops led by Confederate General Robert E Lee battled for the last time.

1864 USA: Arlington National Cemetery was established when 200 acres around Arlington Mansion were officially set-aside as a military cemetery by US Secretary of War Edwin M Stanton.

1877 Henry Ossian Flipper became the first African American cadet to graduate from the United States Military Academy.

1904 USA: The paddle steamer General Slocum burned in in New York City's East River, with the loss of 1,031 lives.

"Twelve-year-old Frank Perditsky ran to the deck below the pilothouse and yelled up to Capt. William Van Schaick, 'Hey Mister, the ship's on fire!'' The captain dismissed the warning as a prank. 'Get the hell out of here and mind your own business!'"   Source

1905 Princess Margaret of Connaught married Gustav, Crown Prince of Sweden.

1911 Tabulating Computing Recording Corporation (IBM) was incorporated.

1911 The Dutch government adopted an anti-gay law, provoking the establishment of the Dutch chapter of the German gay rights group, Scientific Humanitarian Committee.

1913 The Battle of Bud Bagsak

US troops under General John 'Black Jack' Pershing ended (temporarily, for it continues to this day) the Moro people's struggle for self-determination in the Philippines.

This was done by exterminating 2,000, including 196 women and 340 children, (one source has 6,000 to 10,000 men, women and children*) in an assault on the same crater in which an entire community had been similarly liquidated on March 8, 1906, an act of bastardry roundly condemned by anti-imperialist Mark Twain. 

The Moro defenders of Bud Bagsak pitched spears and barongs at the overwhelming firepower of the US military. Pershing "stood so close to the trench, directing operations, that his life was endangered by flying barongs and spears which were being continually hurled from the Moro stronghold."   Source

* "Though official estimates accounted for only 300 Moro casualties (Orosa, p.27), John McLeod,who was in Manila at the time of the massacre, reported that 2,000 were killed including 196 women and 340 children. Pershing was later criticized for his actions but a Congressional investigation into the massacre never materialized…"   Source

"The Moros realized that their time on earth was short. They stood upright on the walls and hurled their barongs and krises at the troops beneath them, wounding four of the attacking force."

"The Mohammedans fought a grand fight at Bagsak"

"In many other battles in the Morolands, the U.S. Army Colt 0.45 caliber pistol was  tested and perfected as an effective "man stopper" against the brave Moro fighters."

"Meanwhile, the Moro situation in Mindanao and the Sulu Islands had again become troublesome."

"They are absolutely fearless, and once committed to combat they count death as a mere incident."

Gen. John Pershing, known as 'the Moro Pacifier'

They were mere naked savages, and yet there is a sort of pathos about it when that word children falls under your eye, for it always brings before us our perfectest symbol of innocence and helplessness; and by help of its deathless eloquence color, creed and nationality vanish away and we see only that they are children -- merely children. And if they are frightened and crying and in trouble, our pity goes out to them by natural impulse. We see a picture. We see small forms. We see the terrified faces. We see the tears. We see the small hands clinging in supplication to the mother; but we do not see those children that we are speaking about. We see in their places the little creatures whom we know and love.
Mark Twain on the March 8, 1906 Moro massacre

Moro resistance    More

"Battle of Bud Bagsak. Ten years after its Disarmament Policy, the Moros continued to resist the American rule. From January-June, the whole ward of Lati with a population of between 6,000 to 10,000, fortified themselves in a cotta in Mt. Bagsak. On June 11, Gen. John Pershing ordered the attack with the assistance of Charlie Schuck who reported that it was easy to attack the cotta. Though official estimates accounted for only 300 Moro casualties (Orosa, p.27), John McLeod, who was in Manila at the time of the massacre, reported that 2,000 were killed including 196 women and 340 children. Pershing was later criticized for his actions but a Congressional investigation into the massacre never materialized. (Gowing, pp. 240-241)."   Source

Articles on Moro history, culture and lifestyle

Moro Human Rights Center

1916 The first and only edition of the magazine Cabaret Voltaire was published, containing work by Hugo Ball, Vassily Kandinsky, Jean Arp, Amedeo Modigliani, and the first printed example of the word 'Dada'.

Dada: The most widely accepted account of the naming of the movement, which flourished until about 1920, is an incident at Hugo Ball's Cabaret Voltaire (Café Voltaire), in Zürich (founded February 5, 1916), a meeting place for artists of the newly forming artistic movement, when a paper knife inserted into a French-German dictionary pointed to the word dada, a child's word for a horse, and the members seized upon it for their anti-aesthetic creations and protest activities, which in turn had been engendered by disgust for bourgeois values and despair over World War I.

1916 US President Woodrow Wilson signed a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America.

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1919 John Alcock and Arthur Brown completed their first nonstop transatlantic flight at Clifden, County Galway, Ireland. Their time: 16 hours, 12 minutes.

1933 China and Tibet signed a treaty ending a two-year war. Guess who won.

1934 In Venice, Hitler and Mussolini met for the first time.

1944 World War II: Battle of Saipan: The United States invaded Saipan.

1953 Release in USA of Marilyn Monroe's first picture, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

1954 The inventor of the Atom Bomb, J Robert Oppenheimer, was declared a security risk by Senator Joseph McCarthy's committee because of his opposition to nuclear weapons.

1957 Eindhoven University of Technology was founded.

1962 Students for a Democratic Society completed the Port Huron Statement.

CounterCulture Wiki    Wilson's Almanac Activism Page   

1963 The face of cult leader JR 'Bob' Dobbs appeared on a tortilla of a humble Mexican woman in Plano, Texas, USA.

Church of the SubGenius

1966 The USA-only Beatles album, Yesterday and Today was released by Capitol in the controversial and Dada 'butcher' cover, with the Beatles smiling amongst a group of decapitated baby dolls. The original cover quickly became a problem for Capitol, so it was pulled and replaced by a more conventional album sleeve.

Wilson's Almanac Book of Days hip list

1968 John Lennon and Yoko Ono planted an acorn at Coventry Cathedral, UK. Reporters insinuated: "They've gone nuts".

1969 On a June day (the exact date appears not to be known) Jim Bishop got the idea to build Bishop Castle, Rye, Colorado, USA. He just kept building.

"In 1969 ironworker Jim Bishop began building a summer cabin in the mountains above his hometown of Pueblo, Colorado. A few years later a casual remark gave him the idea of turning it into a castle. He's never looked back, building steadily on weekends and evenings, more or less by himself and without power tools. Working without architectural training or a formal plan, Bishop evolved the structure as he went along and the resulting building, with its diagonal buttresses, narrow base and high tower, presents a fantastic appearance - especially on summer weekends, when smoke and fire spew from the mouth of the stainless-steel dragon's head which tops the chimney.

"Bishop has carried on his project in the face of the indifference and sometimes the hostility of the local, state and federal governments, which have tried to regulate the development, kept his creation out of tourism publications and objected to his use of stone from the adjacent national forest. In response he insists on the constitutional freedom of the individual and declares his intention to carry on showing that in America one man with a dream can accomplish great things. He has also established a permanent policy of free admission to those wishing to visit, feeling that no one should be priced out of the lesson which the castle teaches."   Source

History   Bishop Castle F.A.Q.

1970 The US Supreme Court ruled that any individual may object to military service on ethical and moral grounds, and need not base their moral beliefs on an organised religion – if such convictions "are deeply felt", giving more responsibility to local draft boards.

1977 The first free elections in 41 years were held in Spain.

1978 King Hussein of Jordan married 26-year-old Lisa Halaby.

1986 Pravda announced that high-level Chernobyl staff had been fired for stupidity.

1992 Whoopsie! During a spelling bee at a Trenton, New Jersey elementary school, US Vice President Dan Quayle corrected a student's spelling of the word potato by indicating it should have an e at the end.

1994 Israel and Vatican City established full diplomatic relations.

1995 USA: While on trial for murder, football player OJ Simpson tried on the blood-stained gloves allegedly worn by the killer of his ex-wife and her friend. "Too tight, too tight", he said, appearing to have difficulty putting the gloves on.

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1996 In Manchester, UK, a terrorist bomb injured over 200 people and devastated a large part of the city centre.

1996 In response to an under-publicised nuclear accident the previous month, six people were arrested at a protest demanding the shutdown of the Point Beach nuclear power plant near Manitowoc, Wisconsin, USA.

Tomorrow: James Joyce's big day: Bloomsday

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